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And the Daytona 500 grand marshal is...

At a NASCAR race, the star power of the grand marshal (the person who says "Drivers, start your engines!") can often reflect the prestige of the event. So when the Daytona 500 came with so-so grand marshals in

At a NASCAR race, the star power of the grand marshal (the person who says "Drivers, start your engines!") often reflects the prestige of the event.

So when the Daytona 500 only had so-so grand marshals in recent years, it was a bit of a letdown.

In that sense, this year is quite an improvement. On Friday, Daytona International Speedway announced James Franco -- an Academy Award nominee for Best Actor (127 Hours) -- will be the grand marshal for this year's "Great American Race."

That's cool because it's especially tough to get a big-name actor to come to the 500, since it falls on the same day as the Oscars (which Franco co-hosted in 2011).